Only in a Dream Ch. 02

He almost thought he saw a little hurt in Jack's eyes for a moment after he said that.

"I'll explain to him later that she came for me," Brad speculated, "If he'll believe me."

Jack was a little perturbed, but Brad had met her first and Jack wouldn't interfere . He was a good friend. Needless to say, Brad didn't leave with Jack that evening.

Over the years, it seemed that everywhere Brad and Kathy went, men would approach her and openly flirt, even with Brad standing right there. They would be out together and men were always taking notice and coming over to say hello, or trying to start a conversation with her. It was almost as if they assumed, that there's no way that this beautiful woman was with him.

There were times when they would be in Walmart or other stores, they would split up while they shopped for different items. Brad had returned to find a man standing there chatting her up. Most of the time, the men would walk away after Brad returned to her side. But on several occasions, the men had told him to back off, if he knew what was good for him.

"No, YOU back off, she's my wife!!" Brad had told them.

One of them looked at Kathy in disbelief and had the audacity to ask,

"Your'e actually with him?? Give me a fucking break!!"

********

"Enough!" Brad thought to himself. He hated thinking about this subject,

"Why in the hell did she have to tell me that crap about Danny and Sharon."

He opened up the track plan book and tried to concentrate.

He turned to the contents and started reading the categories. Medium size layout plans, page 178. He turned to page 178 and stared at the page, but he couldn't seem to get those thoughts out of his head.

"Why?"

His wife was still with him, she was only about thirty feet from him right at this very moment.

"Why do I have to keep thinking about all of these men chasing after Kathy?" he thought to himself, "Shit, and they still are."

It did make Brad feel good about himself a little tho, that the woman that loved him, and belonged to him was so desirable to other men. But he still secretly feared that one would finally break through to her.

He also realized; why a lot of the popular guys that he went to school with were happily married to plain or heavy women. . . They don't have to worry about other men chasing after their wives.

Kathy was now almost fifty six years old, she kept the gray out of her hair and it looked natural, not obvious like a lot of women her age. Her complexion was smooth, she had used Vasoline on her face daily, since she had been a teenager. There was not one single wrinkle and she was still absolutely beautiful. She was only a few pounds heavier, now a size twelve, of course, that made her breasts heavier too, now a 36 C, which Brad enjoyed immensely.

Kathy always complained that she had become fat. Brad assured her that she was not fat, she was perfect and to remember that she was getting older now too. He would remind her of, how several of her really thin aunts looked like 'death warmed over,' by the time they were in their fifties. They looked so much older and unhealthy. Kathy looked no older than forty, she was healthy and that's what mattered.

She still had men hitting on her and it was mostly younger men. Men in their twenties and thirties, their son's ages. It had happened twice just that week. Brad and Kathy were at an appointment and were the only two people there waiting. They were sitting side by side in a single row of about ten chairs. A young man entered the office, signed the log, walked directly over and sat down in the seat right next to Kathy. He leaned in towards her and started to chat her up.

"What's up?" he said as he gave her a seductive smile.

Before he could get out another word, Kathy's name was called, her and Brad rose and headed towards the back. As they got up, Brad glared at the man with kind of a WTF look. The guy just gave him a condescending look as he crossed his arms.

"Move along grandpa," he said.

For a brief moment, Brad felt like slugging the guy, but thought better of it.

"Why in the hell do they always assume that she's not with me?"

Then, the very next day, they had gone to Rural King, to pick up some furnace filters and a new spark plug for their weed eater.

They stopped by their youngest son's apartment on the way, he asked to tag along, because he wanted to look at accessories for his shotgun. The three of them were in the sporting goods section, when one of the young men behind the counter started chatting up Kathy. And once again, Brad was standing right there.

"Are these guys just plain stupid or what? Isn't obvious, that she's with me, or am I invisible?"

He had no more thought that, when the young man started getting brave and looked right at her,

"Are you married?" he inquired.

Brad stepped forward and put his arm around Kathy's waist.

"Ah. . . Yes she is. . .!"

The guy just looked at them in amazement, like he couldn't believe what he was seeing,

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know," he said.

Their son stared at the guy like he'd lost his mind. This guy was no older than him, maybe younger.

"Dude, she's my mom," he thought.

Yep, she was a bonafide MILF.

Then, Brad remembered when they still lived across town and a young guy by the name of Jason had brought a pair of pants for Kathy to alter, he had seemed infatuated with her. He kept finding more clothes that needed repaired and kept coming back.

Kathy's naivety and friendly, outgoing nature gave a lot of guys the wrong impression. Like she was flirting and they might have a chance with her.

Brad then focused his attention back to the track plan book and turned a few pages, looking for the type of layout that might interest him.

Layout 3A: The up and over twice around. A Layout for around the room, he studied it for a little while.

Brad glanced over to his left, towards the back door and wondered out loud,

"I'm hungry, I wonder how long it will be before supper."

He tried once again to focus on the book.

Although he tried to resist it, after all of the apprehension he felt about the different men that had gone after Kathy over the years, and it seemed like they still were. The old memories of Matt and Cindy crept back into his thoughts. . .

********

Cindy's employer had come under new management and her hours at work were reversed. Instead of the seven a.m. to three p.m. shift, her hours were changed to the seven p.m. to three a.m. shift. Cindy wasn't at all happy and complained to Kathy, about how she now had almost no time with her husband, Matt.

"About ninety minutes a day, is all the time we get to spend together during the weekdays, I don't get as much time with my children as I had before either," she told Kathy, "If me and Matt could get by on his paycheck alone, I would quit, but we need my income too."

"I feel fortunate that Brad makes pretty good money and I don't need to work. The tailoring I do at home is just for extra money," Kathy had told her.

On the nights Brad wasn't working, Kathy could usually be found outside working in the yard, or just sitting and relaxing on the porch. Brad started noticing, that as soon as Cindy went to work, Matt would be down talking to Kathy. When Brad would head out to where they were, there was an awkwardness between them that lingered. He knew that the same thing was going on when he was asleep too, but he couldn't monitor it.

"It's obvious that Matt has the hots for you," Brad advised.

"It's your imagination," Kathy informed him.

Then, one day he heard the children talking about how much fun they had been having out at Hilltop Park. Brad knew that Cindy had been working and Kathy had never mentioned anything to him about going out there.

"When was this? When did you go to the park and who did you go with?" Brad asked the children.

"Mom and Matt have been taking us after you go to bed," they told him.

Brad became quite upset with Kathy when he found out, especially since she never bothered to tell him about it. When he asked her about it, she told him,

"When I was growing up, I always had boys for friends and that's all they were, not boyfriends. Girls didn't seem to like me too much, I've only had a few girls as friends, and except for Cindy, their all still in California."

Angie, her ex husband's sister didn't have much to do with her after the divorce.

"I knew that you wouldn't like taking the kids to the park, because you enjoy your evenings off working on one of your cars, or whatever. The kids miss going with me and Cindy, since her hours were changed, so me and Matt started taking them. There's nothing going on between us, we're just friends," she went on to explain.

"How come I wasn't informed of this and I had to find out like I did?" Brad wanted to know.

Kathy squirmed around a little and looked at him,

"Because of what I'm going through right now, I knew you would be upset and wouldn't like the idea of me and Matt being at the park by ourselves. Besides, what could we possibly do with a bunch of kids there?" she said.

Brad still didn't like the idea and told her again,

"Matt has the hots for you!!"

"No he doesn't," Kathy argued.

The trips to the park continued for several more weeks, Brad finally asked Kathy,

"Would you please stop going to the park with Matt? You may not be able to see it, but I can, he's trying to work his way into your pants. Now, he's coming down here all of the time after I go to bed, I'm telling you, he's got his sights set on fucking you!!"

Kathy looked away, telling him once again,

"You don't know what you're talking about."

It all came to a head one evening a few days later. It was just after dark, Brad was in bed asleep and awoke with the need to urinate. He crawled out of bed and headed for the bathroom and noticed that it was too dark and quiet for Kathy and the kids to be there.

He saw the light of the television on in the living room, where he found his oldest son watching television all by himself.

"Where's mom?" Brad asked.

His son looked up at him with apprehension, he also had misgivings about Matt.

"She drove Matt and the kids down to Mcdonald's," the boy reported.

Brad was not too happy about this latest development,

"Mcdonald's is only two blocks away!" he said loudly.

Brad went back to the bedroom, pulled on some shorts and shoes. Grabbing his keys, he headed out to his lifted four by four, climbed in and fired it up. The big V8 engine roared through the headers as he tore out of the alley onto the pavement and gravel was flying everywhere. He drove quickly down the street and up to the stop sign for the main drag that Mickey D's was located on. Just then, he spotted Kathy's car turning onto the next street a block over.

Brad had to wait on a couple of cars that turned the corner onto this street to get out of the way, then he backed up, turned around and raced back down the street. He arrived just as they were coming out of the same alley he had spun out of moments before.

Just as they were pulling up in front of the house, he sped up and pulled in front of them, sliding to a stop, just inches from the front of Kathy's car. He quickly jumped down out of the truck and headed for Kathy.

"JUST WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOUR DOING?" he screamed.

"We just went to Mcdonald's," she sheepishly replied.

"IT'S ONLY TWO BLOCKS AWAY, do you think it would have killed them to walk?!"

"There's nothing going on," she murmured.

"YOU say that, and HE might say that, but I can guarantee you that the whole FUCKING neighborhood is saying something else!" said Brad angrily.

Matt got the hell out of there pretty quickly, he was actually home before his children. Brad outweighed Matt by about fifty pounds and with no shirt on, being as angry as he was, he looked pretty intimidating.

Needless to say, after that incident, Matt didn't come around anymore. The following year Brad and Kathy moved and Kathy always swore that nothing had ever gone on, but Brad was still suspicious.

********

As Brad sat there, lost in his memories, lightning struck inside of the small woods behind the house. The resulting thunder clap made him jump.

"Damn!" he exclaimed out loud.

Brad had always liked storms, especially at night, or during the evenings when he had been sleeping before work. He remembered all the times he had been so comfortable, just lying in bed listening to it storm, that he hit the snooze button a few times too many and just about didn't get to work on time.

Brad almost laughed as he thought about that incident with Matt. But he still wasn't one hundred percent sure that something hadn't happened between Matt and Kathy. Those fears had lay dormant for a long time, but were now brought to the surface by the revelations about Danny and Sharon.

He looked back down at the plan he was studying (or trying to).

"Kurt. . . Kurt Mitchell. He seemed like he was being awful chummy with Kathy for a while to."

Brad was incensed.

"Damn it! Why can't I get this shit out of my head?" he mumbled.

********

Kurt and Debbie Mitchell lived next door to Brad and Kathy when they still lived in their old house. Kurt had always flirted with Kathy during the years they were neighbors, but he never really pushed the issue or pursued her.

Until. . .

After Matt and Cindy moved into the neighborhood, Kurt seemed to take a whole new interest in Kathy. What before seemed like just a little flirting, was now an all out pursuit. He went out of his way to talk to her and made subtle passes constantly, but Kathy never caught on, or just ignored him. Brad picked up on it tho.

"You know that Kurt is after you, the same as Matt is, don't you?"

Once again, Kathy dismissed it, and said,

"You've really got an active imagination, they're just being friendly. They both have wives, or did you forget?"

Brad got along with Kurt, but he was the type of guy that Brad couldn't stand. He was ten years older and just average looking , but he had a way about himself. He was easy spoken and confident that he could charm the panties right off of any woman he set his sights on. He would lie and make up stories about himself and tell women what they wanted to hear. Just like that guy Todd, from Kathy's work years before.

Brad had been inside of Kurt's house a few times and had seen Kurt and Debbie's wedding photo sitting on a shelf in the living room. Debbie was thin and kind of pretty in the picture, but the years since then had not been very friendly to her.

She wasn't really ugly now, she just wasn't pretty, and she had never lost the weight she gained from having two children. But, she was still a little shapely, and she now had 42 C breasts.

In all the time that they lived next to each other, Debbie had never spoken to Kathy other than an occasional hi. She almost acted as if she was intimidated by Kathy.

That summer, the Mitchell's windows would sometimes be open. Brad had heard upon occasion, Kurt and Debbie fighting about how much attention he was paying to that woman next door.

By the time fall arrived, Kurt and Debbie were divorced, a little while later Kurt had sold his house and moved. He was now remarried, Brad and Kathy would see him every once in a while, out around town and he still looked Kathy up and down, checking her out every time.

********

Looking back now, Brad thought maybe he had figured out the reason Kurt had become so much more interested in Kathy.

"Was it because Kurt had seen Matt hanging around all of the time, and thought that she was screwing around with him and he was trying to get in on the action?" he thought.

To be continued. . .